physically fit draft age class of 17-year-olds (about 100,000 each
 year), is being taken into military service. The war in general
 and the bombing in particular have forced Nanoi to divert from
 500,000 to 600,000 civilians (men and women, young and old) to
 full-time and part-time war-related activities.
 3. Nevertheless, it does not appear that North Vietnam is
 encountering insurmontable problems in obtaining sufficient able-bodied
 men to support the war in South Vietnam. Of North Vietnam's
 total population of over 18 million, about 4 million or so are
 males between 15 and 49, and about half of these are probably
 physically fit for military service.* At present, the North
 Vietnamese Armed Forces have taken less than one-quarter of the
 fit males aged 15 to 49 and less than two-fifths of the approximately
 1.2 million fit males in the prime military ages of 17 to 35. Though
 there is some evidence of lowering of draft standards and extending of
 age limits, it appears that, with a few local exceptions, Hanoi is
 still drafting only those between the ages of 17 and 35.
 * These figures are based on US Census Bureau estimates of North
 Vietnam's population, which do not accept entirely the figures
 of North Vietnam's 1960 census and subsequent demographic
 statistics published through 1963.
 -5-
 
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